Guyana is an autocratic state: there is no separation of powers – an ethnic political party controls the executive and the parliament and as a result has significant influence over the judiciary that some have assessed as being in a state of collapse. Political accountability is nil – political competition is rooted in ethnic voting and electoral manipulation – and the power of civil society and groups like trade unions is, to say the least, extremely weak.
In democratic societies where trade unions have the capacity to successfully strike, collective bargaining has increased the wages for organised and unorganised workers by forcing employers to reflect upon their expenditure priorities, and the decline in collective bargaining is important in explaining the growth of global inequality. ‘This erosion of collective bargaining occurred despite large numbers of workers indicating they would prefer collective bargaining if they had a choice. But the political power of those with the most income, wealth, and power prevented the adoption of laws to modernize our labour–management system and enable workers to pursue collective bargaining’(http://www.epi.org/publication/charting-wage-stagnation/).
A similar situation exists in Guyana, where an autocratic government rooted in Indian ethnicity has been attempting to impoverish the African supporters and the organisations of its opponents to force them into its ranks, migrate or disintegrate. For example, in 2004 when this policy was in its infancy, per capita GDP was US$860, the average annual salary of teachers, who are mainly Africans, was 3.4 times GDP, namely US$2,924. Today, since the oil companies and their associates are taking away much of the growing GDP, 3.4 times the GNI (2022, gross national income) of about US$15,000 is US$51,000 but the average annual salary of teachers is about US$7,300! I am not suggesting what teachers should be paid but that the present outcome of the PPP’s decades-long unilateral imposition of public sector wage increases is ridiculous!
GUYANA: IMF December 2023 ARTICLE IV CONSULTATION AND STAFF REPORT
Public Sector Operations, 2020–28
(In percent of GDP, unless otherwise specified)
                                          Years                        2020   2021   2022  2023
             Central Government Expenditure     28.4  24.2    19.6   24.6
                Current expenditure          21.7   17.7   11.1   10.8
                             Wages and salaries       6.3     4.9       2.9     3.1
                             Other goods and services  6.4     5.7       3.6     3.0
                             Capital expenditure       6.7     6.5      8.5   13.4
Now consider the above table in relation to government expenditure and public sector salaries today. Between 2020, when the APNU+AFC coalition left office and 2023, central government expenditure as a percent of GDP has declined from 28.4% to 24.6%. But current expenditure declined from 21.7% to 10.8%.  The wages and salaries of public sector workers declined from 6.3% to 3.1%. What is most interesting is that capital expenditure has gone in the opposite direction, doubling from 6.7% in 2020 to 13.4 percent in 2023!
The government has openly stated that if supporters of its opponents want adequate social services, that is their democratic right they will have to support it. Now, in the absence of trade unions and collective bargaining, this same ethnic government solely determines the wages of the ethnic group it wishes to force into its ranks. In this ethnic/racist political context, one would have to be an idiot not to enquire into which ethnic groups benefit most from the above deliberate unilateral movement in central government expenditure.
We know that Africans are dominant in the public service and as such are most likely to be disadvantaged by this severe decline in wage allocation. In a rudimentary manner, considering the award of some 288 government contracts in 2022 it was argued that while Guyanese of Indian and African descent are about 39.8% and 29.3% of the population respectively, government contracts were awarded 5 times as often to Indians than to Africans and the dollar value of contracts awarded to Indian-controlled businesses was 10 times greater than that awarded to African owned firms (‘Domination’ VV,11/12/2022)!
It is, therefore, fair to argue that by prioritising private sector capital works the regime is deliberately moving resources from wages and salaries for mainly African public servants and transferring them to the private sector that consists mainly of Indian companies.  This can hardly be considered ethnic equitability in the distribution of national resources.
Last year, on arguments based upon the migration of professionals, the regime was forced to announce relatively substantial increases for health care workers, and now dealing with teachers, it has gone through hoops to avoid similar humiliation but maintain its drive for political dominance.
It has defined professionals as those with university degrees who can easily migrate to teaching positions and gave them various levels of allowances so that the increase going to a teacher with an average monthly income of about $125,000 is between 14% and 31%. As for the public service proper, well-remunerated contracts of employment are being given to the professionals the PPP wishes to employ and like teachers without degrees, the remainder can go fend for themselves with 6.5%. It recommends that they find work in the private sector over which it has significant influence by way of ethnicity, contracts, etc.
The PPP’s attempts to explain away its shenanigans and skewed allocations are fruitless for it cannot turn the outcome of an arbitrary and illegitimate process into an acceptable outcome. No one apart from its staunchest supporters will believe its self-interested tirades. That is why Cheddi Jagan’s mantra against accusations of allocation bias was ‘show them the books’ and ultimately trade union disagreements end in arbitration-like processes.
